Irredeemable
by Sampagita
Summary: A crime had been committed; a criminal had been convicted. And no amount of "sorry" would fix any of it. CW: suicide and suicidal themes


**Author's Note: Warning for suicide and suicidal themes.**

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Thin, bony fingers tore out a strip of fabric. Another strip. Another.

Another.

A cackle escaped Hans as he pretended the smuggled bedsheet was his brothers' faces. Queen Elsa's. Anna's.

The mess he made of his life.

Weak hands dropped pieces of textile. A sharp inhale. Shuddering bones in the cold cell quivered as a sob echoed into the lonely night.

No. He did enough introspecting about that.

This time, everything was on _his_ terms.

Hans rent the rest of the cheap linen into strips and began twirling them into coils. He lashed the pieces on until they made a continuous, long strand before twisting it into itself into a thick cord. He held both ends and gave it a firm tug. A section of it came undone and separated.

Even with something so simple he was a failure.

He sighed and remade the makeshift rope.

A pang of hunger stabbed him in the gut, making him recoil, but he continued on with his project. Chilling air breezed through the bars of his cell that lead to the outside and pricked his sallow face, a memory of power behind the swing of a sword in the middle of a blizzard stirring his veins. He embraced the cold and willed the stir of emotion to overwhelm him.

Indignation. Denial. Anger.

Defeat.

Maybe if his family were better examples to him. Maybe if he had been more patient. Maybe if he allowed himself to think things through, he wouldn't be in here. Or maybe none of that would have made a difference.

The lust for power — for _more_ was his and his alone.

It made sense that in his final moments, he would be left with _nothing._

A crime had been committed; a criminal had been convicted. And no amount of "sorry" would fix any of it. He'd been in this cell for too long to hope for a pardon. He knew that "good behavior" could never set his regretful body free and that besmirched reputations are hard to live down. To plan to kill; it was only justice to let his own downfall kill him.

He clamped his eyes.

No. He told himself no more of that.

Tired arms tried the cord again. It held together.

A quiet, frail voice inside of him that he thought had died years ago yearned for adoration. It dared to hope. It crushed him with it's childlike dreams to finally be liked by hundreds and thousands of people and praised as a hero. To be needed. To be loved.

Ha. Love.

Love only existed in fairytales.

He shook his head as if it would release the grasp that tiny voice had in his thoughts. Futile, since he knew it was always there, no matter how much he tried to bury it.

At least this time, it couldn't make him reconsider. Shouldn't.

He clenched his jaw.

It _didn't_ have any sway over him. Not anymore.

Unsure knees and ankles hobbled to the window. He reached up above his head and wrapped a hand around a bar, his fingers too emaciated to feel the ice of the night. That, or he was so perpetually freezing lately his malnourished body no longer knew what the difference of hot and cold were.

Must've been why the prison guard gave him the blanket. What a mistake.

Looks like he was going to take someone's blind trust and naïveté and twist it for his own nefarious purposes again. The stupid voice reasoned that, maybe if he did this, that guard wouldn't be able to live with himself anymore and kill himself, too. It warned of remorse and regret and guilt. It relished in the thought that someone finally cared for him.

Another cackle, louder this time.

As if anyone cared for someone as irredeemable as him.

It had been years since he'd been placed in his cell. His family never visited. Guards checked on him once in a while, but they never had more than a few words to say to him. A priest was sent his way once when he was close to dying from an illness the first year he was here to "carry out his final rites." A _priest_ , not a physician.

To be fair, Hans probably needed the priest more than the doctor.

Too bad he was too stubborn to die then. Now he was without some faint promise of happiness at the end.

His grip around the bar released. In its stead, Hans tied the bedsheet cord into a loop. With both hands and leaning backwards, he tested its strength one more time and found it suitable for his weight. He righted himself and looked at his handiwork.

He landed in here because he was an _attempted_ killer. Fitting that he'd leave when he finally had blood on his hands.

Never mind that the blood was his own.

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 **Author's Note: Okay, so this was written because I was bored and I like exploring characters and scenarios in my head. Plus, I felt like I needed more practice just trying to write angst and stuff. Sure, I have the longer projects I'm working on right now to "practice" with, but sometimes short and sweet can accomplish the same thing. Then again, I probably accomplished nothing.**

 **Also, for those of you that don't know, I enjoy killing off characters way too much and I can't resist. I should probably get that checked, because it's become a cliché when I write, hahaha.**


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